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[malloc]

Not to mention that you actually can learn some useful things in CS educations. But I get the feeling that many CS courses miss the real point in a formal CS education. Which would probably explain the hate towards CS on this forum.

It should be more geared towards theoretical things, such as algorithms and problem solving, not learning how to program on five different platforms, in five industry standard languages.
It's as Djikstra once said: "Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.".
That is why computer science in my country is not called computer science, but rather Datalogy.

Don't get me wrong, programming should be taught in the start of any CS course, but it should not focus on the language, but rather the paradigm. Like, learning a function, a object oriented and a procedural language. This would give insight, instead of empirical knowledge.

[Nadaka]

Not to mention that you actually can learn some useful things in CS educations. But I get the feeling that many CS courses miss the real point in a formal CS education. Which would probably explain the hate towards CS on this forum.

It should be more geared towards theoretical things, such as algorithms and problem solving, not learning how to program on five different platforms, in five industry standard languages.
It's as Djikstra once said: "Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.".
That is why computer science in my country is not called computer science, but rather Datalogy.

Don't get me wrong, programming should be taught in the start of any CS course, but it should not focus on the language, but rather the paradigm. Like, learning a function, a object oriented and a procedural language. This would give insight, instead of empirical knowledge.

Programming wasn't the focus of my Computer Science program. It was all about math, theory, problem solving and towards the end project management.

Though I did have one class where the professor asked for a list of languages that each student was proficient in on the first day. And then asked for each assignment in a different language that no one in the class had on their list...

[Siquo]

It's as Dijkstra once said: "Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.".

And both of those fields are equally useful/useless when looking for a job in IT, is what us paperless people are telling you. Astronomy is maybe even better because it's got the reputation of being fucking hard so you must be smart if you did that.
And I know, I've had astronomers as colleagues, doing the same job as uneducated me

[GlyphGryph]

Mind you, if you're going to be doing research and theoretical stuff, that degree suddenly becomes quite important!

[Siquo]

Mind you, if you're going to be doing research and theoretical stuff, that degree suddenly becomes quite important!

I did say "a job". Definition: It's something you don't like doing, makes the world probably a worse place to live, but you need it to eat.
Getting paid to do research doesn't count as a job (IMHO ), and high-level software architects... is not something one just walks into.

What Tarn does also does not count as a job in my book

[malloc]

Getting paid to do research doesn't count as a job (IMHO ), and high-level software architects... is not something one just walks into.

Then it seems weird that there is actually a demand for high educated computer scientists? I mean, all they know how to do is research right?

But seriously, I many of the techniques you learn at the university for algorithm optimization and problem solving are highly applicable in the real world too.
Concepts like graph theory is simply not something you just walk into and learn when doing programming, its not easy to learn, but still useful in many areas of software development.
(Before you go about proving me wrong and show me that you understand it without formal education, I will say that for most people it is still considered hard to learn.)

Software architecture.. I must agree that the best way to learn it is actually by doing. Having designed systems before helps you immensely when designing new software. But still I think some formal education is a good start, because software design is still part of a CS course.

[GlyphGryph]

Oddly enough, I don't think formal education is worthless at all. I just think going to grad school for after having worked a couple years doing programming is a much better way to do it.

And to this day, I don't understand the point of most undergrad programs - they are essentially grad programs, but without all the bits a person would actually find useful for basically anything. They are basically a scam - I could have easily fit my entire comp sci degree into a single year, but it took me 5 because of how my school works. A friend of mine, going to school for grad school, took all the same real courses I did, and ALSO a bunch of better courses that were off limites to me, and ALSO, due to her life experiences, didn't get bogged down in all the shit a fresh college student has to struggle with.

In fact, all the grads (all having never studied comp sci before) seemed better at everything, in general. The "experience life, THEN go get the education you want" thing honestly seems more effective than any other option I've seen.

[Siquo]

I did get some education, and must admit that graph theory was one of the things I learned in my one year of AI. Haven't used it since. Also have not noticed a demand for computer scientists. Just "computer guys", and the CS ppl are at least semi-proficient (as opposed to the hordes of people who know jack shit about computers (I've got this one story about a single mom who knew how to type a letter in Word, and demanded a programmer job, stating "how hard can it be?") and still want a job in the field).

Ninja-edit: But yeah, Glyph nails it. I know a lot of people in the trade getting educated after their experience.

My personal joke is that I never learned a trade, so I ended up programming. It's the macjob of the future, and why would anyone go to school for 4 years to get a macjob like that?

[MorleyDev]

The UK seems to have a different system. You have undergraduate, which is typically 3 years of study. Then you have post-graduate, which is a masters (1 year of study) and then a doctorate (3 more years of study).

You can go straight to a masters degree or switch up after your first two years in undergraduate, but that still requires you to do all the undergraduate study first either way.

[olemars]

I have little to no formal education in CS and software design, my degree is in physics and my only real programming course used fortran, but I've somehow ended up doing 3D software development in C++. Noone's caught on yet, but I do feel I could use some extra training in 3d-math (goddamn matrix magic) and software design to be honest.

[nenjin]

TBH, of all the things I've considered as part of a game, 3d math is the thing I think I find the scariest. I could fumble my way through a 2d grid, I believe, with enough of other people's algorithms and blood. But a 3d matrix seems like a whole 'nother level of complexity. I'm sure a math person will tell me it isn't really....but that's cold comfort to the math-stupid.

[Levi]

TBH, of all the things I've considered as part of a game, 3d math is the thing I think I find the scariest. I could fumble my way through a 2d grid, I believe, with enough of other people's algorithms and blood. But a 3rd matrix seems like a whole 'nother level of complexity. I'm sure a math person will tell me it isn't really....but that's cold comfort to the math-stupid.

Me too.  2d is something I can sort of wrap my head around(although I still have issues with 2d math).  Doing any kind of 3d programming seems pretty much beyond me unless whatever engine I'm using has a ridiculous amount of helper methods that mathamagically do everything hard for me.

[malloc]

@Siquo
I still find graph theory really useful for problem solving. I suppose it really depends on the person if one is good at applying the knowledge you learn.

I had an assignment some time ago, where I were given stacks of numbers, I was supposed to find the sequence of adding numbers which produced the most primes. The obvious solution, and actually the solution required by the professor was was to brute force it, but the solution sadly ran in exponential time.
But, by rethinking the problem as a graph, I found a method running in polynomial time instead. Which according to the professor was indeed the fastest way of solving the problem he knew about.

Also I don't know if the demand for CS is global, but in my country there is a great demand for especially highly educated computer scientists. According to the education ministries statistics there is between 97%-98% employment rate of newly educated CS's four month after finishing the education.

EDIT:
@Nenjin and Levi
Geometry is hard. I will strongly recommend sitting down and reading through some high school textbooks on vector math, it will help you immensely!

[Levi]

I'd rather avoid it if possible.     I've never had a knack for math, so I'd rather stick with the things I don't find hard.  I'm not too attached to the idea of programming fancy games anyway. 

[GlyphGryph]

Also I don't know if the demand for CS is global, but in my country there is a great demand for especially highly educated computer scientists.

is not actually support by

According to the education ministries statistics there is between 97%-98% employment rate of newly educated CS's four month after finishing the education.

Unless they are being employed as computer scientists. Which I doubt, overall.

Also, where did you get those numbers? Remember that most colleges, when giving you employment numbers, include the folks working McDonalds flipping burgers in their totals. And since you don't include a time limit... 98% is actually kind of low, since it means 2 out of every 100 students is completely unemployable for the rest of their lives after obtaining a comp sci degree.